1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an electrical connector, and particularly to a slanted electrical connector comprising a metallic board lock.
2. Description of the Related Art
Introduced in the 1980s, the Parallel ATA (Advanced Technology Attachment) interface has been the dominant PC storage interface protocol for many years for desktop and portable computers due to the following three primary reasons: low cost, simplicity and high performance.
However, people in the recent years find the Parallel ATA interface dissatisfying for the present needs due to the following pressing drawbacks: firstly, Parallel ATA requires 5-volt transceivers, which imposes integration problems with new silicon processes. On the other hand, evolving parallel ATA beyond 100 MB/sec could require the implementation of technical enhancements, including Low Voltage Differential (LVD) signaling.
Secondly, the electrical connector used for the Parallel ATA interface is featured in high pin count, thereby often having problems in manufacturing, assembling and using. Furthermore, the ribbon header connector can be difficult to seat in the system board during the assembly processes, and can lead to reliability and support issues.
Finally, the 80-conductor cable required to support parallel ATA is relatively expensive and unwieldy to route inside the PC chassis, even worse, the flat ribbon cable used can interfere with air flow and cooling.
Therefore, people in the pertinent art are developing another interface called serial ATA interface to overcome the above-mentioned shortcomings of Parallel ATA interface. Electrical connectors for the serial ATA interface comprise less pin counts than electrical connectors for parallel ATA interface, for example, one type of serial ATA connector comprises only 7 electrical contacts while another type of serial ATA connector comprises only 22 electrical contacts.
The assignee of this application is endeavoring in developing the serial ATA connectors and has disclosed some earlier designs related thereto with the co-pending U.S. application Ser. No. 10/159,458 filed on May 31, 2002 and entitled ELECTRICAL CONNECTOR WITH SELF-RETAINING BOARD LOCKS, with the Ser. No. 10/215,977 filed on Aug. 8, 2002 and entitled ELECTRICAL CONNECTOR WITH IMPROVED TERMIANL RETAINING SYSTEM, with the Ser. No. 10/210,383 filed on Jul. 31, 2002 and entitled TWO PORTS INTEGRAL ELECTRICAL CONNECTOR.
The above mentioned co-pending applications of the assignee the same as this application disclose electrical connectors either in horizontal type or in vertical type. However, some times people want the electrical connector to be somewhat slanted, that is, a mating face of the electrical connector is obliquely arranged with respect to a mounting face, thereby a vertical height of the electrical connector and a space, i.e., the horizontal dimension, occupied by the electrical connector on a printed circuit board being able to get an acceptable balance therebetween.
U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,917,624, 5,041,005, 5,460,537, 5,511,985, and 5,961,346 respectively disclose slanted electrical connectors. All the slanted electrical connectors disclosed in the above mentioned patents are in high pin counts and mate with memory cards inserted into slots thereof. Nevertheless, the serial ATA connector with which we are now concerned is featured in lower pin count and is mated with a complementary cable connector.
Therefore, an electrical connector is desired to match the needs.
A major object of the present invention is to provide an electrical connector defining a mating face obliquely arranged with respect to a mounting face thereof.
Another object of the present invention is to provide an electrical connector which comprises a small number of electrical contacts and a metallic board lock to secure the electrical connector to a printed circuit board.
An electrical connector in accordance with the present invention comprises an insulative housing, a plurality of electrical contacts and a pair of board locks. The insulative housing comprises a base portion defining a mating face and a mounting face, and a mating tongue extending from the mating face. The mating face and the mounting face are arranged obliquely with respect to each other so that an angle xcex1 is defined between the mating tongue and the mounting face. The angle xcex1 is less than 90 degrees.
The base portion comprises a pair of mounting ends each defining a cavity and the board locks are inserted in an upward and forward direction into the cavity. Each board lock is formed with a pair of spaced teeth, an upper tab and a lower tab to provide a retention to the insulative housing.